


Radicle

by coldermoon



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, The Hale Family (Teen Wolf) Lives, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-24
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 21:41:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28963335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coldermoon/pseuds/coldermoon
Summary: Stiles knows better than anyone why making bargains with a nemeton is dangerous, but it can’t be worse than how the world around him had burned into a lifeless wasteland in the past decade.When Stiles wakes up in a past that is both familiar and unfamiliar, can he build a new life for himself?
Relationships: Peter Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 54
Kudos: 207





	1. Ashes

**Author's Note:**

> It's been years since I've watched Teen Wolf, and anything s4-6 I've never seen, so while I read fic and occasionally the wiki, my memory of canon that I'm disregarding is fuzzy at best, fair warning. To be honest I'm not sure how this is going to end yet, tags to be added and rating possibly changed as I update, no beta. This is mostly just me writing for writings sake, so while it's not necessarily the best technical-writing-skill-wise etc, I hope it's cool and fun and that you enjoy!

Stiles knows better than anyone why making bargains with a nemeton is dangerous, but it can’t be worse than how the world around him had burned into a lifeless wasteland in the past decade. Beacon Hills is little more than a ghost town, the same as most of the United States, if not every corner of the globe. The wild hunt had come and stolen what remained of the world away after the Argent virus had claimed two thirds of the population. Stiles had only survived because Peter had been too stubborn to let him die in that no place. He’d tricked Stiles into escaping, returning him to the tattered remnants of human civilisation.

A wonky street sign creaks in the breeze and birds circle overhead as he steps on nothing but cracked sidewalks. He still remembers what each of the buildings had been. It’s like living in cracked glass, waiting to shatter. The world was once fuller. He had met other supernatural creatures who had survived, he’d even had a dog for a while, but as much as it helped his sanity, nothing soothed the gaping ache inside himself. This place has no human future, so Stiles had been forced to explore other options.

He had gone through all of the Hales’ texts before striking out. He’d broken into supernatural strongholds and hunter fortresses alike, stealing from abandoned supermarkets and hotwiring cars and feeling like every cliched movie he’d used to make fun of. If only he had an ounce of magic, but manipulating mountain ash couldn’t help him travel in time. He’d searched until like a bad penny he lands back where he had started, drawn by the world’s last living nemeton.

The last few years had not been wasted. He had traced this apocalypse back to it’s humble beginnings. The hunt had been the last stroke, the virus had been the main force, the silent killer. Gerard’s brainchild, birthed even before he’d terrorised their town in search of their bite. He could go back to that point in time, and make sure he died then, but the science behind it had taken years. Stiles had almost died retrieving the diary, enshrined as it was in a place of honour at the hunter council’s stronghold. The people were all gone, but like tombs of old, traps had been laid.

It had started with the wolfsbane gas Gerard had used on Deucalion. If he could weaponise wolfsbane that way, why not destroy the supernatural scourge entirely another way? The death of his favourite niece had only made his desperation worse. Even if he had taken Beacon Hills, it would only have been the beginning. No, to stop Gerard Stiles will have to go back far enough to ensure he never gets his worst ideas. 

He camps out in what remains of the high school for the night before making his way into the charred remains of the forest. It had burned so brightly and so long the last ever astronaut had surely seen it from space. A bargain with the nemeton had taken Stiles’ mother from him, but without it he would never have existed in the first place. The texts he’d read called him a child of the trees’ roots. In old tales they’d been able to communicate with the forest. The dead wood around him weighs on him like lead.

Stiles has never been someone to do things by half, so when he stands before the aged stump he knows exactly what to ask for. What it wants in return he gladly gives.


	2. New Beginnings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first chapter is more of a prologue really, so here's the first proper meaty chapter. I'm going to try to update once a week/every other week, but work is hell right now unfortunately I can't make promises. Thank you for the kudos, subscriptions and kind comments!!

Stiles wakes to darkness, pressure and something lodged down his throat. It’s more scratchy than a hospital tube, and the damp, earthy smell is all wrong, too. He screams. Feeling something shift beneath him only makes him scream harder, tears welling at the corners of his eyes as he chokes around the tube.

Something lifts him, more tubes curling around his limb to support but not restrict him. And—oh shit—yes, he’s naked. Very naked. And moving. The feeling around him shifts and he realises it’s earth. In a split second he remembers. He’d bled out on the stump, and as the world had faded around him, the nemeton had taken his body, claiming him.

When the earth falls away he has to shut his eyes against the sun. The tube finally leaves his throat and he feels the nemeton’s power withdraw with it. That had been the deal. He would give himself to the nemeton, and in return it would stop the Hale fire from ever happening. Out of all the magics found in this world or another, the nemeton’s relationship to time is unique. The tree had needed to heal. To Stiles, nothing had ever seemed as clear-cut.

He rubs his eyes, finally blinking into the sunrise. Wind caresses the trees, the smell of pine and recent rainfall the most miraculous scent.

A hysterical laugh creeps up his throat.

Instead of being a charred corpse the forest is alive, tall and green and thrumming with life. Stiles pressed his hands into the damp earth. He can feel more than the ley lines. The land and forest themselves whisper to him, indistinct for now but maybe he can teach himself to listen. The nemeton’s power spreads through the preserve, reaching further than its roots ever could, healthy and alive and whole.

Memories came back to Stiles in fragments and he sits on the ground, leaning against the trunk of the now tall and proud tree. He drinks dew from leaves the roots collect for him. The bargain. His time beneath. The memories are both there, and not. He’s been conscious as if in a dream. Standing in front of the stump in the ashes of a broken world feels like yesterday, but like flipping open a book, he can leaf through his time spent as part of its roots.

He doesn’t know how long it has been, but he remembers taking the nogitsune inside himself for a second time. He’d fought it again. Shuddering, Stiles runs his fingers through his hair. It’s the same length. Feeling his face, he still has the beginnings of wrinkles. His power is different now, he feels it catch and pull with every breath. Before he’d sensed the nemeton’s presence, amplified by how the rest of the world’s magic was slowly dying. Now he’s bound to the tree, though he can’t see any marks it has left behind, except for huge swathes and streaks of caking mud. Checking his body, he’s relieved to see the same moles, same muscles, same scars.

“What the hell did you do?”

It’s been months since he’s seen another person, which is enough to make him jumpy, but it’s the unmistakable alpha undertone of demand that makes him flinch.

He turns to face a woman. He recognises her by the frown and dark hair. Talia Hale.

She’s alive.

His bargain worked and Talia Hale is standing in front him, alive and well.

Not only that, but he’s here with her. Another hysterical laugh bubbles up through him, hacking and wheezing. He hasn’t been underground for a hundred years. Or—he could have been, but the time he’s been returned to is in his past, not a distant future.

More wolves join her, some half shifted. Stiles realises that laughing like a madman is probably not helping, spluttering as he tries to calm himself. It’s been a while since he’s had to play nice and remember his manners, human or werewolf.

“Nothing—I did—nothing.” Stiles coughs. “Well, not nothing. But this was all the nemeton’s doing.”

Amongst the wolves his eyes find one very familiar figure. Peter. The same steel blue eyes and jeans. No murder goatee, though. He looks, quite simply, younger.

“You are an intruder on Hale territory,” the man beside Talia snarls. Stiles recognises him from family photos. Talia’s husband and her second, Matthias.

“Alpha Hale, I am not your enemy,” Stiles says. He knows they can hear his heartbeat. They can smell the truth on him.

“No, but that doesn’t explain what you are,” Peter says, face shifting back to human as he cocks his head.

“Send for Deaton,” Talia orders, and one of her betas scurries away. Laura? “You’re coming with us.”

Stiles holds his hands up in the universal gesture of surrender. Matthias still grabs his arm roughly.

“Easy, easy,” Stiles mutters. Unnecessary violence is a Hale family trait, apparently.

The walk through the forest takes a good part of an hour, with Stiles still weak from having been buried alive for an uncertain number of years. He can feel Matthias grip him tighter every time he stumbles, as if fearing that he is trying to run.

When he sees the house, he has to gawk. It’s a beautiful giant cottage, with a large windows, a spacious yard and wooden garden furniture on a patio. The burnt out crisp of a home hovers in his mind, a shadow of a future past. There’s grills and toys, and beyond the large windows he sees a living room that resembles a den with all couches and blankets.

“Stay,” Matthias grunts and finally lets go.

A handful of wolves are left standing outside as Talia enters the house through the sliding door, rejoining the wolves who stayed behind. Stiles would be stupid to run. He should try—the less the Hales know of him the better—but he’s weak, and despite their suspicion, he is not their enemy.

Stiles chooses a lounger and drops himself onto it, sprawling. Too much time spent alone has made him unashamed of his nudity, not that wolves have ever cared much about that.

Still, it surprises him that its Peter who emerges from the house first, with a pair of joggers and shirt that sort of match his size. When he sees that shirt is v neck, his heart swells. In those last days in the nowhere station, Peter’s scent had been the only thing that felt real. Everything else had been intangible, melting into smoke like the nogitsune's tricks. Then Peter had burned again to send Stiles back to the world, leaving him all alone.

It was different for wolves, _more._ Stiles had let Peter curl them up together to sleep, his nose pressed into the softness where his jaw met his throat. Safety, that’s what Stiles smelt as he pulled on the clothes.

Feeling eyes on him, Stiles looked up to see Peter frowning at him. Yes, even at 26 he can still be a bit of an emotional mess, but Stiles thinks the extenuating circumstances allow for it.

“He just appeared in the preserve?” Deaton asks, stepping out onto the patio.

Stiles feels himself gawk again. This younger Deaton has hair. And an earring.

“There was a rush of power. The territory, it was… unsettled. The nemeton was screaming.”

It must have hard for it to give up it’s heart, Stiles thinks. Wait—its heart? Having years of other memories that hadn’t yet blended with his own is starting to give him a headache.

Talia turns to him. “What were you trying to do, darach?”

“I’m not a darach,” Stiles bristles, then bursts into another fit of coughing.

Peter sighs. “Get him some water, someone.”

Stiles coughs some more, then sits, suddenly dizzy. Couldn’t the nemeton have let him wake up with a bit more power? He can feel it in the blade of grass between his toes, permeating the land, but the nemeton isn’t feeling generous enough to give him extra juice. It probably needs it all to heal itself, which Stiles doesn’t begrudge in the slightest.

That had been the deal. The nemeton needed power to change the past. Stiles was a willing sacrifice. He had expected to die. What he hadn’t expected was to be buried alive. What he hadn’t expected was to wake up. His life force had helped the tree heal and had acted as a focusing lens so that he could travel back in time. More detail than that is a fuzzy flower yet to bloom.

Laura appears with a bottle. She gives it to Stiles with sneer. His wrists are almost too weak to twist the cap, but he manages, saving his pride.

“I’m not a darach,” he repeats after emptying half the bottle.

Talia and Deaton share a look.

“You were hurting the nemeton. If not in a failed attempt to bind it to you, then why?”

Stiles snorts. “It wasn’t intentional. And it hurt me just as much.” He remembers the agony in the abstract, and feels the scratches down his throat all the more sharply. The knowledge that his body hasn't aged is too sharp, and all the more weird because he knows he’s spent years down there, feeding an entire forest.

“You’re still intruding on Hale territory.”

Technically, Stiles has spent an indeterminable amount of time being part of Hale territory.

“No, I would feel if he was an inturder.”

“You would feel it?” Stiles asks, leaning forward.

Deaton had been one of the first to die. He’d contracted the virus while treating the first cases in quarantine. Thanks to him they knew it had its origins in a lab grown strain of wolfsbane. In the end it had mutated so rapidly and frequently, only those who were immune survived. Other supernaturals, or a lucky quarter of all humans.

“Check him,” Talia insists.

Deaton raises his hands, and mutters in Latin. Stiles recognises some, the word for reveal is among them. A light green cloud of mist puffs from Deaton’s palms, surrounding him.

“You’re magic?” Stiles gapes.

“You’re obviously familiar with wolf packs,” Peter points out, finally speaking up again, but only after waiting a beat to see if Talia would jump in. “So you must be familiar with emissaries.”

Stiles glares at him. Yes he’s familiar. But Deaton had been decidedly un-magic. And according to Morell, had always been that way.

The mist swirls around him, a tiny army of cyclones. A strand of mist reaches out to caress his cheek, before it all dissipates.

“He means us no harm,” Talia says, sounding surprised.

“That is not how it usually acts,” Deaton points out. “What are you?”

“And what do you want from us?” Laura pipes up, standing beside Matthias. Alpha in training, Stiles remembers. For a species that values their instincts so highly, wolf culture can be fantastically entrenched in ritual and tradition. But Peter is standing even further away than the left hand usually would.

“I’m…” Stiles doesn’t know what he is anymore. “I was part of the nemeton.”

“Root child,” Deaton says.

“What’s that?” Talia asks.

Before Deaton can answer, Peter jumps in. “One born of the nemeton’s magic. There are stories of how they could bond with a nemeton.”

“Or heal it,” Stiles nods. Trust for Peter to know the same obscure lore he had spent years digging out. In fact, the first mention of it had been in one of the books in the vault under the school. Hell, his Peter had probably worked it out years ago.

Stiles shakes his head. He can’t think like that. For all that he misses his Peter, this Peter and this world are now his. His old timeline is exactly that—his, and no longer anyone else's. In a way, he took their lives from them, but in exchange he's giving them a fighting chance.

“Then I have you to thank for nemeton’s gift,” Deaton says. “I was born without magic to a family of druids, but after Alpha Hale accepted me despite my… shortcomings, the nemeton welcomed me.”

Stiles catches Peter’s eye. The look he’s giving him, half curiosity, half predator hunger, settles him. Not everything here is different.

“But you never felt him?” Matthias says.

“I’m not sure I would have known to look.”

It makes sense. With renewed life force, the nemeton would be able to pick a new protector. And if Deaton had had magic, then he could have saved the Hales from the fire more easily. He needs to find out the date. Subtly, he thinks, glancing at Peter again.

“But the timing! He’s arrived hours after the Argents. Last time they almost killed us all!” Talia insists.

“Gerard is here?” Stiles demands, standing. His fist reaches for his baseball bat but closes around air.

Talia slits her eyes at him. “How do you know him?”

“He killed everyone I love. I think… I think the nemeton sent me to help you.”


	3. Argents

His admission has convinced Talia of his intentions, at least for now. There is no faking the bone deep grief and despair he feels remembering the past decade. How he must reek to them. He tries not to think of the details, of his father’s face as he’d bled out in Stiles’ arms, or how Lydia had burned in Eichen house, or Scott had died choking on black blood in the hospital… the urge to curl up into a ball passes as he breathes in and follows the other wolves into the house.

He's made as much peace with his grief as he can years ago, now he needs to close the book on everything but what he knows of Gerard and his plan. He needs to stop him.

Stepping onto the patio, the world looses some of it’s sharpness. It must be his connection to the nemeton. Always there, but stronger if he’s in physical contact with nature. The wood is warm under his feet, and the carpet plush. He curls his toes around the softness before Matthias growls at him impatiently.

"He needs a shower first," Peter says, wrinkling his nose.

Okay, Stiles sniffs himself, that is some BO.

"Get him new clothes," Laura agrees.

He's herded upstairs, past a half eaten breakfast spread in the living room and up a wide staircase. Matthias unceremoniously hands him off to Peter, whose lip curls as he pulls him into a very empty but still pleasant bathroom of sea blue tiles and soft towels.

He takes his time, making sure to get rid of all smells offensive to extra sensitive noses. Patting himself dry, he then rifles through the cabinet and makes quick use of a can of shaving cream and a disposable razor he finds. He then puts Peter's clothes on again, but not before hiding his face in the softness for one brilliant, grounding minute.

It gives him the strength to walk back down and into the den of wolves.

Position and hierarchy are important in wolf packs, even in something so simple as a seating arrangement for a meeting. Sitting next to Talia would be considered offensive, and sitting too far away in the ring of couches, chairs and beanbags would be considered equally dismissive. Matthias and Deaton sit next to her as her advisers, while the others fan out around her. Peter is perched on the arm of a chair not too far away but not too close anyone else, either. Stiles lets his patched up heart make his decision for him as he collapses into the butter soft leather, pulling his knees up to his chest. 

Peter’s reaction to Stiles’ choice is so minute that if Stiles didn’t already know him, he’d miss the way his ear twitches. After years of being at the receiving end of Peter’s wolfy powers, it kind of evens the playing field between them. He deflates into the sagging chair. It’s been so long since he’s been with others inside a human looking home, something inside him is unravelling.

Some of the gathering adults give him a weird look, other bordering on sympathetic, as if he doesn’t know he’s sat next to the left hand who’s seeped in blood. As if Stiles hadn’t basically filled the same position in Scott’s pack, wolf or no.

The food has been cleared away and only a stray mug of tea or coffee remains. Matthias pulls two children onto his lap, while surly teenage Derek and Cora are spread out on some beanbags with another girl he recognises but can’t name. Like her, he only knows the adults from the photo albums in the vault.

“What’s your name?” Talia asks once everyone has settled.

“Stiles.” Anything else would be an obvious lie. If his counterpart exists here, then he probably can’t write it off as a weird coincidence, but something inside himself tells him not to worry. If changing the future meant he was never born, then he could never have done it in the first place—the way of paradoxes headaches lie. Stiles rubs his temples.

“No surname?”

“I don’t need one.” His father— _his_ —is as dead as his mother.

“Where did you come from? The nemeton can’t create a human life,” Peter twists so he can watch Stiles’ face, making their knees knock together.

“A time that no longer exists.” Stiles licks his lips. He can’t hide that he’s time travelled, but… “The Hales were in control of the territory, too. They were always kind to my family.”

It was true. Peter had offered Dad the bite. It hadn't taken.

“We have no record of a root child’s sacrifice,” Talia says to Matthias and Deaton.

“Records were lost,” Matthias points out uncomfortably. So the gaps in the diaries Stiles had found had been there for a while.

“And it makes sense with how the territory has strengthened. Sometimes it can take decades, or even a century, for a sacrifice to mature. Most of the nemeton is underground, we don’t even see it.”

Stiles blinks. Deaton is being so helpful. Or maybe he always has been, he just didn’t have enough context or magic for better answers. Still, the earring… at least young Peter doesn’t have a mohawk, then he really might give himself away with a case of uncontrollable giggles.

In fact, apart from his hair being longer, and his generally being younger and slightly less movie star hulked out, he’s not that different. Talia looks as regal as in the photos, like she’s just stepped out a shampoo advert. Derek has pimples, which gives Stiles a strange kind of vindication because his first impression of Derek will always be of a scary adult who could crush him like a bug, no matter how much of an awkward softie he really is.

“How do you know Gerard, if you’re from the past?”

“I…” Stiles feels another wave of dizziness, heat climbing up his cheeks. In his periphery, Peter’s ear twitches, the sun catching his cartilage and making it shine pink. “The Argent from my time was called Gerard.”

Laura nods. “Family name.”

“Do we know why the Argents are back?” Stiles asks, partly from his burning desire to seek out Gerard and kill him as quickly as possible, in a way that ensures he stays dead, and in part to divert the conversation away from his strategic not lies. So much of deception is letting other people fill in the blanks.

“To finish the job,” Talia bristles, eyes flashing red.

“A year ago Kate Argent tried to set fire to our family home with all of us trapped inside it,” Peter explains.

Stiles tastes the clear water of relief. “I’m glad they failed.”

At least one tragedy has been adverted, even if they now face another potential one. He has so many questions, but asking them is the wrong move to make. He needs to kill Gerard and keep as much of his true origin secret as he can. Researching his new condition is important as well, he’s never heard of a root child sacrifice staying alive. The nemeton will want him back after this. Like his mother’s, his is a life debt.

“He’s genuine,” Derek says, finally speaking up. “We should trust him.”

Stiles heart tugs and twines. How he’s missed Der-bear.

“We’ll take the help we can get, but you’ll have to earn our trust,” Talia decides.

The warmth in her eyes makes him wish he was here for uncomplicated reasons and could do just that. “There’s nothing I want more.”

“We need to figure out what they’re up to and stop them.”

The pack agrees with murmurs and nods.

“Peter,” Talia says, standing. “Investigate as usual. I’m going to reach out to some contacts. We’ll meet again this evening to discuss our progress.”

At that exact moment Stiles’ stomach lets out an impressive rumble.

“You must be hungry,” Deaton says.

“And you have homework to get back to,” Matthias informs Derek and Cora, whose eye rolls could enter a synchronised competition at the Olympics.

The family disperses in an organised chaos. Stiles lets most of them leave the room before standing, pausing to steady himself on the arm of the chair as another wave of dizziness passes over him.

Peter and Talia join them in the kitchen. The layout is very communal, the large kitchen opening onto an open plan dining room, with a breakfast bar between them. Floor to ceiling windows let the sunshine in, making Stiles feel as if he still part of the forest. It settles something inside him, being among the trees and knowing he is allied with the Hales, at least for now.

Even in the beginning, it had been about them. His own involvement had been an accident at best. Scott and his father had been his greatest concern (they had been the centre of his world), but he hadn’t been able to hear about what happened to the Hales and not care. For so many reasons—it was wrong, Scott was a target, too, his father’s suspicions were right… and it had been the Hales who had done the rituals, walked the borders and kept the town safe, up until they couldn’t anymore.

Stiles hoists himself onto one of the stools, twisting it this way and that as he rests his elbows on the laminate counter. The interior and appliances aren’t new, but are well cared for. Loved, even. A coffee maker sits beside a carafe, which Peter is pouring two mugs from. He promptly sets one in front of Stiles before sitting beside him.

“Sandwiches?” Talia asks, flicking the switch for the panini press on.

“I could murder a sandwich,” Stiles admits. Since his hunger had made itself known, the caving emptiness in his gut had suddenly taken him over. The coffee is bitter, but warm, and all that much better than anything he’s had in years because he’s finally not drinking it alone.

“What did Gerard do?” Peter asks just as Stiles takes a sip.

It takes tremendous effort not to spit or choke. Undoubtedly the kind of reaction Peter is hoping for. Stiles understands, he wouldn’t trust himself either.

Carefully, he sets the coffee mug down and pulls the borrowed shirt off. He turns his back to Peter.

“This was only the beginning.”

He feels Peter’s fingertips trace a couple of the larger scars.

“Oh Stiles,” Talia gasps.

“There are… I know ways to heal them,” Deaton offers as Stiles pulls Peter’s shirt back on.

“No, thank you,” Stiles says and grabs the closest sandwich. He moans at the taste of crunchy lettuce, melting cheese and tender chicken. It is the best thing he’s ever eaten, he’s sure. He doesn’t even care that he’s smearing mayonnaise around his mouth.

Peter takes one and eats it decidedly more carefully.

When Talia and Deaton move to finish the washing up—they’d probably just finished breakfast when Stiles awoke—Peter focuses his attention on him again.

“The Argents are moving back to town later.”

“And you’re going to be there?”

Peter nods, his tongue darting out to catch some cheese threatening to fall out of his sandwich.

“I’m coming with you.”

Peter smiles, smug and warm. Like Stiles has just walked into exactly what Peter wants from him.

Things are better when their goals align, but there’s always something else with Peter. Something that he wants, or is planning, or trying to get. Even younger, and not broken in all the same ways, the same is true for him.

“Perfect. We can pick up some proper clothes for you while we’re at it.”

Stiles flexes his toes. Some socks wouldn’t go amiss.

Peter informs Talia that he’s coming for a ride along and they finish their sandwiches. Stiles asks for foil so he can take a couple with them, while Peter grabs his jacket, wallet, keys and a mobile phone that resembles a brick. How ironic, that this actually a technological upgrade compared from when he’s arrived from. They acted like the digital age would last forever, but as soon as the servers were fried there wasn’t much left to hold onto.

Stiles eats in the car, and Peter is mostly silent as Stiles trundles through Macy’s at the mall. In and out in half an hour with a quick stop at the dressing room. Jeans, shirts, socks, briefs, a couple of hoodies and a waterproof jacket with a removeable fleece lining. In a stroke of luck someone had left a newspaper in the dressing room. The date is October 12th 2005, _Local Force Warn of Repeat Pranksters This Halloween_. His heart clenches as he remembers his Dad’s stories about the gang of teenagers who had taken it too far that— _this_ —year.

For shoes he gets a pair of boots and a pair of running shoes. Peter buys it all on with a swish of a card, giving his practical choices an approving nod.

“Everything else you can borrow, there’s more than enough at the house,” Peter says, dragging him past a display of hiking backpacks Stiles is eyeing.

They walk to the car, a family sized seven seater. A good choice to stake out suburbia. He wonders if Peter even has his own car. It’s so strange, how similar he is, and how… unfinished parts of him are in comparison. No hair gel. Submitting to an alpha’s authority. No asshole facial hair that looks unfairly hot. And totally not what coming to the past is about, Stiles reminds himself.

“Any ideas why they’re choosing to come back now?” Stiles asks once they’re in the car again.

“A few,” Peter takes a turn carefully. “The school year started a month ago, so it can’t be planned.”

The most likely things to make hunters run are other hunters, especially the hunter’s council. Unless they’re running towards something.

Peter’s quiet until he’s finished squeezing into a parking spot. They have a good view of a house just down the road, bright red SOLD sign swinging back and forth in the breeze. He cracks a window before turning the engine off and ushering Stiles into the backseat.

“Good idea, the tinted windows will—”

Claws at his throat stops him from speaking.

“So, Stiles,” Peter smiles unkindly. “Tell me how, since you’re from the past, none of our newer technologies such as televisions or cars or credit cards have come as a surprise to you?”

Hah. Peter has him there.

“It seems to me that you haven’t quite told us everything.” Peter’s grip tightens, just on the edge of breaking his skin.

“The nemeton.” He can feel Peter’s claws scratch as he speaks. Swallowing, his Adam’s apple bobs into the warm heat of his palm. “I… wasn’t conscious, but it fed me things in dreams.”

A part of him can feel Peter, he realises. Not just physically, where one of his legs is pinning Stiles into the car seat with his werewolf strength, but his life force. Now that he’s woken up, fed and calmer, he can feel connections to all the Hale pack, human members included. It’s not unlike a pack bond, except that it’s a one way street. If they hadn’t found him, he suspects he’d have been able to use them to find them before long.

“Sacrifices to the nemeton don’t wake up.”

“I’m just as surprised as you,” Stiles says. “I expected to die.”

Peter’s hand retracts, but he keeps Stiles pinned. His eyes flash, steel blue. Up close, he can smell that Peter isn’t wearing cologne.

“So the nemeton gave you information to prepare you for this?”

“I guess. My memories are fuzzy. It’s not like I really understand it either. I just… know things.” Like how all the trees in the forest can breathe as one. How the worms burrow in complex patterns. Where the light and moisture is best for mushrooms to bloom.

“What does it have against Gerard?”

“It’s scared of him. It doesn’t speak to me in words, but I can sense it’s fear.”

Peter assesses him for a few more seconds. “You’re not lying.”

His voice is neutral, too causal. It’s practised, but younger Peter doesn’t quite have it down to a pat yet.

Stiles considers his options. Revenge is a motivation Peter can understand, but then he has to explain how he knows this Gerard. Being an ally to the Hales is not enough. Anything else is revealing too much.

“I know he’s not the same person, but I need to make the Argents pay for what they did to my family.”

Peter keeps watching him, as if waiting for him to give the game away. Stiles is mostly relieved his body is still too weak from being part of a tree to pop a boner. He used to imagine this, Peter surrounding him. What it would be like to be the focus of his whole attention.

“What if they had succeeded in killing your family? If they had killed everyone you loved, how would you feel?” Stiles asks.

Peter hesitates. “I would want my revenge, too.”

Finally, he shifts and slides into the seat besides Stiles’.

“I still don’t trust you, Stiles with no last name. If you do anything to hurt my family or the land, you will regret it.”

“I won’t,” Stiles promises, but he’s not sure who he’s making the promise to.

A moving truck appears at the end of the street. Show time.

Chris gets out the driver’s seat, then walks around to open the other door. A small brunette girl is passed down to him, Allison, before Victoria climbs down to join them. Stiles knows better than to talk. Peter’s head is cocked, listening.

They go inside for a bit, and Stiles thinks maybe Gerard won’t be arriving today, but then a four wheel drive pulls up and out steps the man himself.

His fists clench of their own accord. How easy it would be to just get out the car and end it here and now. Gerard would have a sidepiece on him, all Stiles would need to do is take it from him and shoot him between the eyes.

“Patience makes the reward all the sweeter,” Peter whispers, not even looking at Stiles.

Gerard goes in the house and Stiles tries to calm down. The darkness around his heart from the nogitsune has never left him. The darkness _in_ his heart has been there since before Stiles can remember. Scott would tell him that people do good things. His father would say that you can make good choices. Stiles doesn’t agree with either of them. There’s safe and there’s not safe.

Leaving the car now would be not safe. He unclenches his hands from around the car seat.

Chris and Gerard come out again. He can’t hear them like Peter can, but their body language is tense. Chris had never loved his father, not like Kate had. Is she coming too? Gerard got under his skin more, but he wants to kill her just as badly. Although, Stiles glances over at Peter’s profile, she’s probably still his kill. The light makes his edges look soft, like he could slip away again.

Once they go inside again, and Gerard drives off, Peter informs him that they won’t be finding anything out again today. Before he starts the car, Peter reaches over to grip Stiles’ still shaking hands. When he squeezes them firmly, he’s warm and real and safe. Then he’s gone again, twisting to look over his shoulder as he puts the car into reverse.


	4. Deucalion

Peter goes off to do other things once they return to the house, leaving Matthias to show Stiles to the guest room where he’ll be staying. He has nowhere else to go, and the Hales want to keep him close. Either he’ll reveal himself to be a threat, or he did sacrifice himself for the Hale pack, in which case, he is their ally and they owe him.

In the chronicles and histories he’d read root children had never been revered, but they had been cared for, if only for the chance that their death might be used to strengthen a nemeton. It couldn’t be just anyone. Most were bestowed **powers** when they were young, the nemeton either awakening latent magical abilities or gifting them. They became connected to the territory, and if the tree ever died, so would they.

“If you need anything, just holler. Someone will hear,” Matthias says, smiling with too many teeth as he drops off Stiles’ bags from the mall. Checking the ensuite bathroom (seriously, how is this house so big but still so cosy), he finds all his needs have been seen too, including ones he doesn’t anticipate. He’s confronted with not just moisturiser, but exfoliator, pads, three sizes of toenail clippers, what looks like miniature sheers, and a whole cupboard of other things he doesn’t recognise. At least the human sized toothbrush and toothpaste is familiar.

Being in the mall had taken a lot out of him, more than he’d realised. His hand shakes and he brushes hi teeth and washes his face. Now the adrenaline is wearing off, he’s struggling to process everything. After blinking at himself in the mirror for a while, he all but face plants on the bed.

When he wakes it’s to unbearable softness and a gaping hunger. Actual, true human hunger in his stomach, not the phantom need for sunlight and air and nutrients pulled from places he isn’t connected to anymore. It’s strange, how he feels simultaneously like less but so much more.

He’d been desperate, he’d made plans, rules for however the past bent and shaped itself… but actually being here is more overwhelming than he could have imagined. It’s not the creature comforts—he had been able to recreate those, mostly. It’s the people.

He can hear the house creaking somewhere and he has to remind himself it’s a person. He’s talked more than he has in years. In the beginning he’d taped himself and listened to every recording he could find. There’d been creatures. But nothing compared to the strange familiarity of human community.

After showering, he pads downstairs. The sun slants in through the kitchen windows, not a glare so direct to turn every room into a greenhouse thanks to the cover of the forest foliage. He eats and tidies what he uses away into the dishwasher when he’s done. 

Drifting through the rooms of the house, he slowly connects them to the burned out husk he has spent all too much time in to waking reality. Supporting beams are hidden by plaster and paint, but still stand, enduring. A few stuffed toys are scattered on the couch, jackets hang on hooks at hip height as well as up top. The kids must be at school and most of the adults at work or working on something else. He hears dim music and knows instinctively that there is always someone home to protect the pack den. No longer possessing his charms that let him pass without detection, he knows that the Hales would stop him if his exploring was unwelcome.

Upstairs, hand drawn signs set doors apart. Talia and Matthias’ have a lot of flowers, Cora gets a superhero and someone has given Peter a chess board. At the end there is an unmarked door that Stiles is surprised to find unlocked.

It opens into a room lined with shelves and a reading nook by a large bay window. He drags his fingers along the spines, feeling heavy leather bound book after book as the door clicks shut behind him. One book left out on a shelf catches his eye. The binding is new, and when he opens the first page the title is familiar. It’s a copy of a journal in the vault, which in his day was half destroyed by bugs and time.

 _Jebediah's Fourth Volume of Useful Natural Herbicides for your own Witch’s Garden_ is not of particular interest, but after a short search Stiles finds the shelf dedicated to the nemeton. All that had remained after the ravages of the trials of Beacon Hills had been a few select pages of a diary of a root child from medieval England. He’s been searching for years for a complete copy. This one is in Latin and Stiles feels a sudden rush of gratitude to Lydia for drilling him so hard that his skills are still pretty fresh.

She had died screaming, saving them all from the giant snake that had erupted from the sewers. It had wanted to feed off the nemeton and had decided they would make a fitting appetiser.

A bit of rummaging in the desk uncovers a pad and pencil. Settling into the plush couches and grabbing a blanket, Stiles settles in to read. It’s rambling and mostly personal, so he skims a lot passages about the cost of cheese and arduous comparisons of how the weather affects transportation timetables and whatever the hell was important back then.

The interesting stuff is about how ley lines play the role of the planet’s living magical organs. It helps explain how in his future the whole supernatural world had been dying. If you killed all the nemetons, then eventually you would kill the entire organism. The moon would still be there, and the tide, but there would be no extra pull and therefore no more werewolves. No more anything supernatural. Earth would have gone on, and humans, too, if not for the virus. But even before Gerard’s plans had started, the number of nemetons had been declining for the past 300 years.

The writing gets abruptly shaky when it gets to describing her father’s death. She has been taken before the council—the hunter’s council—to be tried as a werewolf. He had been one, but she had been born human. When they found no evidence that she could shift, they let her go unwillingly, claiming there was something else wrong with her. But the old laws had been written in blood that could not be broken. He father had been the leader of the pack. As such it had been his right to trade his life for those in his pack that would otherwise have been sentenced to death.

It was then that she had come into her powers, which she describes as gifts. They had taken her beyond the edge of death and back trying to force her to shift.

A soft knock at the door announces Peter poking his head into the room. When his eyes meet Stiles' he smiles, no teeth, and walks towards him. "We've got company. Talia has invited Deucalion Blackwood, another alpha who was wronged by Gerard, to stay. His flight from Germany got in an hour ago so he should be here soon."

Stiles frowns. "So fast?"

"You've been asleep for over a day, sweetheart."

Peter takes the book out of his hands, laying it down on its pages on a shelf, marking his spot for later. "As glad as I am that someone other than me has an appreciation for this room, you're needed downstairs."

Stiles stares at the hand Peter offers him. Yesterday he'd been ready to kill him at a moment's notice. He undoubtedly still is, but there is something unexpectedly gentle about how he holds Stiles' fingers in his.

"I'm _needed_?" Stiles asks.

"Seems Alpha Blackwood is interested in meeting a fabled root child." Peter's lip curls and he still doesn't let go of Stiles' hand, leading him down the wide, wooden stairs.

"And it's that much easier to keep an eye on me." But Stiles says the words with good humour. If Peter wasn't suspicious it would make him worry. "Keep your friends close…"

Peter tuts.

"As if I would ever be that cliché, don't do me that disservice."

Stiles suppresses an eye roll.

"Do you need a refresher on the rules of engagement?"

And now Peter is testing him. The condescension gets under his skin all the same. He’s always testing. Motives hiding within motives, obscuring and betraying a myriad wants and schemes. All to hide the simplest and most normal of all animal needs. Stiles has been Peter’s ally before. He’d used to think the fire had changed him, but standing here he realises that he has it wrong.

"When meeting with the alpha of an allied pack, those closest must stand beside the Alpha, but slightly behind in deference to rank. Then, descending in rank, behind her. Those in tertiary positions follow," Stiles recites from a handbook he'd stolen from old Peter's apartment a lifetime ago.

"Luckily for us, Deucalion doesn't stand on ceremony."

Stiles can't help but smile. He walked right into revealing just how deep his knowledge goes. That he used to be part of a wolf pack is not a secret he wants to hide. Whether Peter thinks it may have been the Hales is another matter.

“But I recommend a respectful distance all the same,” Peter says quietly, leaning close so Stiles can hear his hushed tones.

Peter's scent is sharper now than it ever was before, a power—gift—from binding with the nemeton. Peter smells earthy, with hints of burning oak and rain. The rest of the Hales smell of the forest Stiles grew up in, but nothing more. He has run with wolves for too long for anything else to truly feel like home.

At the bottom of the stairs, Peter let his hand go, but not before they're noticed by a familiar figure. Stiles is surprised to see Deucalion wearing his sunglasses. Some part of him had thought that maybe he had been spared. But the fact that he is here and not creating a murderous cult is proof enough that nothing in time travel is straightforward or linear, and like the wide reach of tree roots and mushrooms under the earth, the changes he has wrought on this world tangle in oblique ways.

"Peter, so good to see you again. The debt has not been forgotten."

"There is no debt," Peter says, strangely stiff.

"This is him, isn't it? The root child. I have been waiting so long for you. May I? " Deucalion reaches a hand towards him, stopping a few inches from his face.

Taking his wrist in his hand, Stiles guides it safely touch over his features. Deucalion maps out the bridge of his nose, the ridges of his cheekbone, the delicate skin of his eyelids, and finally down his vulnerable neck.

"That's enough," Peter says. "Alpha Hale is waiting.”

Deucalion withdraws, bowing his head on apology. "He's always been this protective. It's an admirable quality."

Peter grabs Stiles by the shoulder and steers him towards the den, covering the same spot that Deucalion had just moments before.

Stiles isn't stupid. The neck is like scenting central for werewolves. Peter could have been more obvious, but it is still unsubtle enough to be a clear message to Deucalion. This one is claimed.

The spot Peter chooses is further away from Talia than his position would normally dictate. As much as Deucalion doesn't stand on ceremony it is clear that Talia does, judging by how everyone but Peter sits according to ritual. Deucalion smirks in his direction as if they are sharing a private joke.

Talia claps her hands and the idle conversation dies immediately.

“As we all know the Argents have returned to Beacon Hills. We don’t know why they are here, but I believe we are all in danger. They almost succeeding in killing all of us the last time they were here.”

Stiles feels Peter tense beside him.

“I can help with that, at least a little,” Deucalion speaks up. “My contacts in France said he left very quickly, as if he was running.”

“But the Argents are from France originally,” one of the Hales speaks up. A cousin, Stiles thinks.

“The rest of the family are still there. But from I hear, what they were doing was disturbing, perhaps even to their fellow hunters.”

“Could they have broken the laws again?” Matthias speaks up, face half hopeful, half murderous.

“If there was admissible proof they would have been convicted.”

Talia and Peter share a look.

“They should have been convicted for what they tried to do to the Hales,” Deucalion explains. “And to me. Makes you wonder how much more they’ve gotten away with, doesn’t it?”

“But why come here?” Laura says, arms crossed.

“He probably has some kind of back up plan. A way to restore or gain power,” Peter finally says.

“Probably supernatural,” Deucalion adds.

Talia laughs bitterly. “How was it you put it, the joys of living on a hellmouth?”

Peter blushes a little.

“He’ll need local contacts,” Stiles says. So what if Peter watches Buffy?

Deucalion nods, fingers steepled. “Probably the same people as last time, there are undoubtedly some we missed.”

“Maybe the sheriff can help?” If the fire hadn’t happened, Farleigh wouldn’t have had to step down. He has always been reasonable, at least his diary had made him seem that way, and he had known about the supernatural going ons.

Laura laughs. “He’s too new to have been initiated.”

Stiles reshuffles mentally. Not Farleigh. Could it be McCreedy? Someone from out of state that got called in?

“There is someone we could ask. A rookie. His wife is in the know, but I am not sure if he is,” Peter says.

His Dad must still be a rookie. He hadn’t had a chance to investigate the fire, still stuck on the beat.

“I’ll reach out,” Matthias says.

“I’ll print off the reports from my contact and we can go over them?” Deucalion asks, directly addressing Peter.

“Good plan,” Talia says.

A few more things are discussed, but Stiles struggles to hear the individual words. They run together, fading into the background.

He’s sinking into the couch. The warmth of Peter by his side stops him from being swallowed. He’s in his body and not. He feels the forest outside, can hear it like he hears the blood beat in his own ears. Too quiet and too loud at the same time.

“We’ll reconvene tomorrow and hopefully have a better idea of what he wants.” Talia’s alpha tone bleeds through, pulling Stiles back a bit.

He stays on the couch as the others move, Laura groaning at being roped in to help with dinner, Matthias saying something about kids and homework. All normal, family things.

It’s a lot. All the people. All the activity.

“Stiles,” Decaulion says, closer than he was a moment ago.

“Where did you go?” Peter asks.

“Nowhere. I guess I’m still tired. What’s for dinner?”

“Steak,” Deucalion says, grinning like the villain he isn’t. When Peter moves, Stiles misses the warmth.


End file.
